


Then help me, we will cheat him together.

by Madame_Samovar



Category: Penny Dreadful (TV)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-07
Updated: 2020-07-07
Packaged: 2021-03-04 19:08:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 650
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25131391
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Madame_Samovar/pseuds/Madame_Samovar
Summary: Gifted thanatologist Catriona Hartdegen is the only one that won't accept Vanessa's death. For Death is never an ending if not a beginning.
Relationships: Catriona Hartdegen/Vanessa Ives
Comments: 2
Kudos: 8





	Then help me, we will cheat him together.

**Author's Note:**

> Long time without writing, needing to do something new to get back to it, no beta be kind ;-* tell me if it interests you, there is little to no fanfic on this pairing, which is unbearable.

\- Then help me, we will cheat him together.

Oh words. Her words. She could remember the texture of that afternoon when she had spoken those words to her. Vanessa Ives and her daring look, promising adventures till being robbed of slumber itself. Vanessa Ives and the length of her shadow that will never cease to expand now.

Thrust. The tip missed and pursued its course into the void.

Surrounded. Cherished even if she were to remember how each member of this odd dysfunctional family had fought for her. How they had those gestures, looks of kindness, the fragile type, the one that is so crisp, so heartfelt, that it clashes horribly with the rough decorum of reality. How they were mourning her. Loved. Yes, Vanessa had been loved. Like a friend, like daughter, like a sister, and for some more fortunate, even like a lover. Ethan. 

That bloody fool. 

She barely avoided the blow.

Those ungainly hands had pressed the trigger. Same hands she had seen joined in shameful prayers on Vanessa’s grave. But saved for giving her away, saved for wallowing, what had those hands accomplished? Nothing. To be male and powerful, to be loved and be the lucky one, and to capitulate. 

Parry. She relished the pressure that threatened to crush her.

That afternoon it hadn’t been the twirling smoke of Vanessa’s cigarette, not the leather and the wood of the room neither had it been the light, but the woman’s presence that had coloured her whole perception of time and space. The weariness of the troubled medium had shown, yes, understandably, but her demeanour and what she used to bring to the moment had remained unadulterated.

Slash. Almost.

A stillness. A stillness had coated that afternoon. No, though not prone to racket (would it had been different if Vanessa had shouted? Dug her nails into flesh, drew blood, and refused loudly to die? Now she wished she had done so, she wished she would have been awfully loud and never ceased screaming “No I don’t want to die!” for it would have meant that she was still here, that she was not gone. But she was gone, was she not? She had seen her leave after all. The shell, without the sea.) Vanessa had not been quiet out of timidity. She had saved space for what was not yet but could come forth. Observing with those huge stormy eyes the motions and faces, the lights playing and their absence, of the Announced and the Faint. Her smiles had been memories of a time when Catriona knew she had then found her place amongst all. For each one of them an echo calling to what had been lost.

And lost she had. Plenty.

She lunged with all her bitterness, effectively digging the tip into a padded heart. The peace of mind that fencing usually brought her was elusive today and it irked her greatly. 

Men and their Gods, Men and their Devils, it all came to two opposite sides fighting, seemingly almighty, and Men only there to serve and be the prize of a sick conquest. What Men failed to notice, through the numerous names, through the numerous cultures, Good and Evil were the one to collect, but not to part. The cloak that draped the frailty of the human body for a final time was not from God, this last embrace not from the Devil either. The last curtain to fall was Death itself. An even bigger concept for the mind to grasp. It coveted each breath, it was carried, tenderly coiled in her chest, a depth to life that would always accompany all of them. Catriona Hartdegen was not afraid of Death, for she knew it contained the infinite possibilities of what was to come. And as Vanessa used to do, she was to pause, to listen to the tremors and wait until something came forth.


End file.
